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The Cancer-Curing-Console? PS3 To Be Used For Disease Research

by Brandon Dimmel on September, 7 2006 at 08:09AM EDT

The computer network Folding@Home, responsible for researching protein development and supply, has announced its intent to introduce a service on the highly-anticipated Playstation 3 (PS3). The console, developed by Sony and reportedly ready to launch this November, will apparently be used for such research because of its powerful Cell processor.

Folding@Home -- whose name sounds more like an Ikea knock-off than a cancer research company -- believes the PS3 Cell processor can help achieve incredible database performance. Folding@Home intends to compound the production of Sony's wares by linking about 10,000 units together. The linkages and performance capabilities will provide realistic simulations to study protein folding and other similar diseases, from cancer to Alzheimer's to Huntington's. (Source: theinquirer.net)

That's all well and good, so long as the PS3 actually ships. The only assurance that the console will be ready for its ship date is coming from Sony itself, who have told the media that it plans to ship 4 million units, somehow, by year's end.

According to some sources at the recent Leipzig Games Convention in Germany, the media was able to touch the PS3 but couldn't actually play it. Instead, Sony representatives told curious onlookers that a not-ready-for-primetime secret was stored on the console in question, and as such they refused to boot up the powerful new machine. (Source: theinquirer.net)

The countdown is less than three months away, and Sony still refuses to power on the PS3 in public. It kind of makes you wonder how effective those health simulations might be on a blank screen.